虚拟角色商品化权法律保护刍议——美国实践的启示

Analysis on the Legal Protection of Merchandising Right in Fictional Characters:Implication of Practice in the USA

"三毛"漫画形象纠纷案引起了我国知识产权法学界关于虚拟角色商品化权的广泛讨论。由于缺乏法律的规定和理论的支撑,此种权利纠纷案件的审判结果或有失公平,或有失统一。本文通过对美国虚拟角色商品化权由来的历史介绍及其保护的现实考量,认为我国应借鉴美国实践中所采取的综合保护模式,参考美国判例法中所形成的保护标准,关注与研究典型案例,必要时以司法解释的方式确立虚拟角色商品化权的保护标准。

The case of ＂San Mao＂ brings broad debates on merchandising right in fictional characters in the academic realm of intellectual property law. For a lack of explicit legislative provisions and theoretic supports, the judicial fulfillment has lost fairness or unity in the judgment of cases related to merchandising right in fictional characters in our country. Via analysis on the legal protection in the U. S. the authors conclude that we should draw lessons from the synthesis protection mode adopted by the U.S. in practice, make reference to the protection standard formed in American case law, and focus and do research on typical model cases. When necessary, we can establish the protection standards of the merchandising right in fictional characters by the way of judicatory explanations.